Tag: Vintage clothing

House Next Door: The Dreaded Downstairs Kitchen

My younger kids are back in school today. My teaching won’t take off till next week, so today I dropped the kids off at school, came home and headed next door.

We really just have two rooms left, but they are a bit tricky. I didn’t have the trailer today and most of the stuff in the back bedroom is bulky enough that just needs to be thrown straight into the trailer. I bagged up as much loose stuff as I could.

We still have a closet of clothes that haven’t been gone through. But, I’m going to let my daughter go through them first and then just toss them straight into the trailer.

After that, I headed into the kitchen. Andy has already done a lot of work in here. There is a lot of glassware that is keepable, but we need to pack it into boxes so it won’t all break. Haven’t done that yet.

I threw away everything that was plastic and aluminum. There was an extensive amount of original Tupperware in the house. Nothing that I would want to store food in any more.

Unfortunately, there were still some cupboards with food stuff in them. I tried to look for dates and there werent any. So, old enough that they hadn’t put expiration dates yet.

That cupboard was not too bad. Mostly all glass jars and rusted out cans. I was standing up, lots of space around me, squeamish but doable.

Then I got to this cupboard..

It is in the island and I had to sit down on a stool with my back up against a cart and the bag right next to my legs and the cupboard was really deep so I had to reach way back to get stuff. I found myself whimpering and by the time I was done, I was shaking. I left one line of cans in the very back of the bottom shelf because in order to reach it I would have had to kneel down on the floor and stick my head in. Couldn’t do it. There is still one more food cupboard on the other end of the island, but I didn’t have it in me to do it today. Also, still have two fridges that need emptying.

I need an empty trailer and probably my husband there for moral support to finish off this kitchen and back bedroom. Getting so close to being done with the clean out!

Free House: Outside Cleanup

Today is a lovely Tennessee Spring Day! Andy and an assortment of kids got outside and cleaned out some bushes and trees from the yard next door.

Here’s the before:

And then the after:

And all the brush at the alley waiting for a pickup, which fortunately our city does for free.

In other news, Andy did a job for a business opening up downtown. He got connected with the owner and found out she sells vintage clothing. He told her about our Free House and how there were several closets full of clothing that had been hanginging there for years. She came over to see what we had and ended up buying a nice big pile of stuff, so that was nice!

I’m glad spring is finally here. The warmer weather makes everything feel a little easier and all this brush cleared away makes the house feel a lot more approachable.

I’ll post more later!

Free House: Moving Upstairs

It’s been a while since I’ve been on here. We had one of the busiest holiday seasons I’ve ever had. It was a lot of fun, lots of good memories, great time with my kids, and we ended with the wedding of my oldest son! Then all the kids that came home for Christmas left, school started back up, and this weekend is the first time that I’m feeling like I can catch my breath a bit. It’s been a great day, I got my grocery shopping done first thing this morning, assigned my kids some chores, and then Andy and I went next door to tackle the next project. We worked three hours, came home, showered, and now I’m looking at the rest of the afternoon and evening with nothing on the schedule. Woohoo!

Today’s clean out was a lot more physically intense than normal. We have finally moved upstairs.

Which means everything has to come down those stairs, then you have to climb back up those stairs again to get back to work. We tossed lighter things down the stairs, but we escorted the big giant trash bags. At the top of the stairs is a rather large landing that had been turned into a bedroom.

We filled our trailer.

And then still had lots of stuff to fill another trailer load.

So, this is how far we got today, both of us working. I feel a little bit like an archeologist as I try to figure out the time line for the house. I found mail on the floor upstairs from 1999, which seems to be a significant year as I really haven’t found much mail or newspapers from before then. The upstairs ceiling is lath and plaster, and that started to fall apart at some point in time, so they put a cheap drop ceiling over the lath and plaster. Then I think enough of the original ceiling collapsed that it weighed down the drop ceiling and made that fall as well. So, we were cleaning up a lot of house debris today. As usual, I am always amazed at how much stuff can be crammed into one small space.

In other news, one of my older daughters went through some of the clothes that have been hanging in closets and tried washing them to see if they’d come clean, and they did! She is an eclectic dresser, so she had fun finding some things. This silk suit didn’t fit. Not sure what I’m going to do with it. But it’s clean!